


What’s In a Date

by mist2393



Category: King Falls AM (Podcast)
Genre: Ben Arnold is a panicky bean and we love him, Fluff, Found Family, M/M, Slight Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-15
Updated: 2020-09-15
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:21:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26478631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mist2393/pseuds/mist2393
Summary: Jack and Sammy are acting very strange all day. Ben’s anxiety-brain makes him assume the worst, and he panics
Relationships: Ben Arnold/Emily Potter, Sammy Stevens/Jack Wright
Comments: 7
Kudos: 38





	What’s In a Date

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally part of a larger Jack-is-back fic I’m semi-working on, but the vibes didn’t really match the fic, so I decided it worked better as a stand-alone fic. 
> 
> I also have a headcanon that Ben lets Jack call him Benny. At first because he doesn’t want to correct Jack, and then just because he’s Jack and Ben likes when Jack does it.

Ben liked to think of himself as being a pretty smart guy, all things considered. He had put things together that most people wouldn’t have even noticed. He had saved Emily, had helped save Jack. He had even helped Lily and Jack with research for their Wright On videos and had discovered a lot of things on his own. 

But he could not, for the life of him, figure out why Jack was acting so strange all day. He had woken up early and brought Sammy breakfast in bed, which was odd mostly because Sammy  _ hated  _ breakfast in bed (at least, he told Ben he did, but Ben was beginning to suspect that was another on the long list of  _ things Sammy associated with Jack and therefore hated when Jack was missing _ because Jack had also brought Sammy breakfast in bed on their anniversary). 

Then, when Sammy and Jack finally came out of their room two hours later, Jack shoved Sammy onto the couch and told him he wasn’t allowed to do anything remotely labor-related all day. Emily had shared a confused look with Ben, and Ben was happy that he at least wasn’t the only one thrown off by Jack’s behavior. Ben didn’t think he’d ever seen Jack be so forceful with Sammy (except the one time Ben had accidentally walked in on them and he tried his best not to think about that). Sammy had grouched and complained, but he was smiling the entire time with that fond look he got whenever Jack was being sweet. How was Jack being sweet? 

Ben looked over at Lily for help. She’d know what was going on, right? From the smirk she sent him, she knew exactly what was going on and had no intention of telling Ben. Which was pretty in character for her, so Ben wasn’t even sure what he’d been hoping for, really. 

He would have assumed maybe it was something private between Jack and Sammy. Some anniversary they weren’t comfortable sharing with the world. Except why would Lily know about it if that was the case? Ben groaned and tugged at his hair, and Emily shot him an amused glance from across the table. She knew he’d been trying to figure this out for the last hour. 

“Benny,” she said, her expression sympathetic as she reached over to squeeze his hand. “Why don’t you just ask them?”

“I don’t want to intrude,” Ben replied, looking over at her. “What if it’s something private? Jack was super open about their anniversary, so if he hasn’t said anything about today, that means it’s probably private, right? Except I’m pretty sure Lily knows what today is and I don’t think Jack would tell her if it was that private.”

“They’ll be back from Rose’s soon. Just ask them when they get home.” Emily shrugged.

“That’s another thing!” Ben exclaimed, suddenly straightening. “Since when did they go to  _ Rose’s _ without us? Dates in Big Pine, sure. But  _ Rose’s _ ? That’s  _ our  _ family place. I just don’t get it.”

“Are you  _ jealous _ ?” Emily teased, smiling playfully at Ben. “We can go to Rose’s together, just you and me, sweetheart. Will that make you feel better?”

“No!” Ben said immediately, then he looked at her. “I mean...not that I wouldn’t love going out for a meal with you, Em. I love you, obviously I’d love scheduling a date with you. But I just want to know what’s going on here. Like...what if Sammy’s sick and that’s why Jack’s being so nice to him? What if he’s dying and he doesn’t want me to know in case I freak out or something? Oh fuck, Sammy’s  _ dying  _ and he thinks he has to hide it from me. I can’t lose him! What am I gonna do? What-“

“Benny,” Emily cut in, reaching over to take his hands gently. “If Sammy were dying, he would have told you. And Jack would be freaking out a lot more than he is. You know he wouldn’t let Sammy just hide that kind of thing.”

Ben took a few deep breaths, meeting Emily’s eyes. “Okay. You’re right. Jack’s not panicking, and Sammy’s not acting sick. I’m just...I don’t like it when they hide things from me.”

“I know. We’ll ask them when they get home.” Emily stroked Ben’s hands with her thumbs. “Do you want to do something to distract yourself for a while? We can watch some tv?” 

“I...tv would be nice,” he replied. He stood and followed Emily over to the couch. They curled up together, and Emily turned on HGTV so they could watch something relaxing. Ben rested his head on Emily’s shoulder so she could stroke his hair. 

Almost an hour later, Sammy and Jack walked into the apartment, laughing together. Ben looked over at them and sat up, forcing a smile. Sammy stopped when he saw him. 

“What’s wrong?” he asked, walking over. Ben frowned. How did Sammy always know what Ben was feeling? And now he had ruined whatever good mood Sammy had been in all day because he couldn’t get over his own need to always know what was going on. 

“It’s nothing,” Ben replied, looking away. Sammy sat down on the couch next to him, brow furrowed. 

“We’ve talked about this, man. If I’m not allowed to hide my struggles from you, you’re not allowed to hide your struggles from me.” Sammy smiled at Ben, and Ben just shook his head. Damn, he hated past him a bit for making that promise. 

“I don’t want to ruin your good day. I’m just panicking over nothing. It’s fine. It happens.” Ben shrugged. Sammy rested his hand on Ben’s arm. 

“Talk to me, Ben. It’s not going to ruin my day. My days are always better when you’re happy.”

Ben sighed, glancing at Emily for a moment before looking down at where Sammy’s hand was resting. “It’s going to sound really stupid.” He took a deep breath. “I just...Jack’s been really nice to you today. Not that he’s not always really nice, but he’s been unusually nice. And then you guys went to Rose’s alone. I’m not...I’m not saying you guys can’t go places without me. I’m not that codependent. But you normally go to Big Pines on your dates. And I just...I couldn’t figure out what was going on so then I kind of...panicked? Because that’s what I do, apparently. And now I’ve ruined your mood and made everything about me and you and Jack were having a good time.”

“Sammy, I know you prefer being an enigma wrapped inside a secret, but maybe we should tell them,” Jack cut in, frowning. Sammy looked over at him, then looked at Ben. 

“First of all, I’m sorry for making you panic all day,” Sammy started, squeezing Ben’s arm. “It didn’t really...occur to me that you might be seeing everything Jack’s been doing and assume something was going on. And it’s not like I wasn’t telling  _ you _ , specifically. Jack and Lily are the only two people who know what today is, and I just...don’t usually tell people. I don’t like people knowing. It’s just...I don’t like people making a big deal over me, you know that. And if people knew...it would be a big deal every year. It’s...today’s my birthday.”

Ben listened to Sammy carefully, forcing himself to remain quiet despite the fact that he was getting more and more nervous the longer Sammy spoke. He blinked when Sammy finally told him it was his birthday. That was...not what he was expecting. He had tried, during Sammy’s first couple of years in King Falls, to get his birthday out of him, but had dropped it after that in favor of helping Sammy find Jack. He had honestly forgotten that Sammy’s birthday would even exist. 

“Your...birthday?” he finally repeated slowly. He suddenly sat up. “Sammy! You gotta let me do  _ something  _ for you! You always do so much for mine.”

“That’s because you like it when people do a lot for you, Ben. I don’t.” Sammy shrugged. “Even Jack only treats me to meals for the day. I just don’t like acknowledging it all that much.” 

“I get that. I do.” Ben shifted. “But I’m your brother. I wanna do something. I’m not saying we need a party or anything. I just...want to do something for you. You do so much for me.”

“Ben, you’ve done more for me than I could  _ ever  _ do for you.” Sammy pulled Ben into a hug. “Jack wouldn’t be here to celebrate with me if it wasn’t for you. Hell,  _ I  _ wouldn’t be here to celebrate if it wasn’t for you. You’ve saved every person in this house at least once. You could never do anything for another person ever again and still come out on top on the karmic scale.”

Ben curled into Sammy’s arms, clinging to him. It had been an emotional day, and it was starting to catch up to him. 

“We could have a movie night and you can pick the movie,” he murmured after a few seconds. “Would that be okay?”

“That would be perfect,” Sammy replied, resting his chin on top of Ben’s head. “Because I’m going to make you watch Jurassic Park and you’ll have to pretend to be brave in front of Jack.”

“I’ll just cuddle with Emily and claim it’s for her benefit,” Ben stated. 

“That would work better if I wasn’t standing right here,” Jack teased. “But don’t worry. Sammy’s a wimp with slasher flics. We watched Saw and he couldn’t walk into a dark room for a week afterwards.”

“We watched A Haunting in Connecticut and you jumped every time you heard a noise for  _ days _ ,” Sammy countered. “At least serial killers are real.”

“Apparitions  _ are  _ real, babe.” Jack smirked at Sammy, then looked at Ben. “Come on, Benny. You can help me cook Sammy dinner.”

“I thought you were just at Rose’s?” Ben stood up though, walking over to Jack. 

“That was just the cover we used,” Jack replied, walking into the kitchen with Ben. “We were at the mall in Big Pine getting Sammy a gift. Lily met us there, then went to do whatever it is Lily does when she’s not here.” 

“Katy,” Sammy called, accompanied by surprised laughter from Emily. Jack rolled his eyes. 

“You just had to go and make it weird, didn’t you?” Jack called back. Ben sniggered, pulling himself up to sit on the island while he watched Jack. 

“So what are we making for Sammy?” he asked. Jack pulled out tomatoes and onions and set them on the counter. 

“Homemade pasta sauce,” Jack replied. “It’s the only thing I can make better than Sammy can. Well, that and kraft mac and cheese. Sammy always manages to mess it up.”

“He puts too much milk in, usually,” Ben said. “He tried making it for me once because I told him it’s my comfort food and he was trying to make me eat actual food instead of coffee and snickers bars. It was so soupy. But I ate it because he looked so hopeful when he fed it to me, and now he thinks I like it that way and I can never go back.”

Jack laughed, patting Ben’s leg. “Happens to all of us. It’s hard to say no to Sammy when he’s done something for you. I spent five years choking down this weird Greek dish he discovered on one of our work trips before I finally had to admit that I hated it. It included lamb’s tongue. It was so gross but he was so proud of himself for getting it right.”

Ben was quiet for a moment, watching while Jack started dicing the onion. 

“Jack, can I ask you something?” he finally asked quietly, not wanting Sammy to overhear. 

“Yeah?” Jack set down his knife and looked up at Ben curiously. 

“Do you think Sammy’s upset that I know about his birthday now? And that I pushed him to let me do something?” Ben looked down, fidgeting. 

“Not from what I could tell,” Jack replied, reaching out to squeeze Ben’s wrist. “Sammy loves you, Ben. He knows you just want to make him happy. We knew each other for almost seven years before he finally let me make him dinner on his birthday, and we lived together for most of that. I only knew his birthday because I had to keep his driver’s license updated for the station we worked at down in Florida.”

Ben nodded, eyes focused on the onion again. “Is it true you burned the spaghetti the night you proposed?” he asked after a minute, unable to stay quiet for too long. Jack snorted. 

“I’m guessing Lily’s told you that?” he asked. Ben just nodded again, smiling softly. 

“Indirectly, but yeah. Sammy was teasing her about something she’d tried to do for Katy and she uh...brought up that night and called you a disaster child.” Ben shrugged, his smile turning shy. He and Jack got along great, but he was still worried he would somehow offend Jack or push him away and lose both Jack and Sammy (he was under no illusions that Sammy would choose Ben over Jack if it came down to it). 

“Well, she’s not wrong,” Jack admitted, laughing. “Of the two of us, Lily’s always been more...together than I am. Nothing I’ve ever done isn’t steeped in nine levels of embarrassment and failure.” 

“What do you mean?” Ben was offended that Jack could ever think that about himself, and he was sure it showed on his face. 

“Did Sammy not tell you anything about our relationship?” Jack looked up at Ben, looking confused. Ben shook his head. 

“Just that you were together and in the closet about it. He implied that it was his fault you guys were in the closet. And he let slip a while later that you were engaged because Lily was being...Lily. But other than that, he didn’t say much. He didn’t like talking about you much at first, and then when he did start to open up, it was mainly random moments or facts about you, not about your relationship. I don’t think he was ready to think about it too much, let alone talk about it.”

“Every major development in our relationship was a direct result of me being dumb or embarrassing myself. Or both.” Jack grinned at Ben. “People think I’m cool because I’m a rugby player from LA, but people who know me well agree that I’m just a giant disaster on two legs.”

“Like what?” Ben frowned, swinging his legs a little. He was definitely a disaster, and it was hard for him to look at Jack, to remember the stories Lily and Sammy had told, and think that Jack was a disaster too. Then again, both Sammy and Lily had told Ben that he reminded them of Jack. 

“Well, take our engagement for one.” Jack put the chopped onions into a bowl and got to work chopping the tomatoes, slapping Ben’s hand playfully when he stole a piece. “I was so nervous that I dumped half my spaghetti down the drain and set the rest of it on fire when I put it back on the burner that was very much still lit. We ended up having spaghettios for dinner. I wasn’t going to follow through on my plan to propose that night, but Sammy was so nice about the whole thing, and then we were watching Destination Truth and eating spaghettios and I just...proposed. Over a bowl of spaghettios. Lily hasn’t let me live it down since I told her about it.” 

“I know you find that super embarrassing, but I think that’s one of the most adorable stories I’ve ever heard,” Ben told him, tears in his eyes. “I just...you two love each other so much and it makes me so happy.”

“You and Emily love each other too,” Jack pointed out, ruffling Ben’s hair with his clean hand. 

“I know, but it’s not the same. I mean, I love Emily more than anything in the world, but you and Sammy are like...you’ve been together for so long and been through so much and it’s just...a different kind of love. I don’t know. I can’t explain why it feels different. It just does, and it makes me so happy to see you two together again. To see Sammy looking so happy again.” 

“Aww, Benny.” Jack leaned over to kiss Ben’s forehead. “It makes me really happy to see you and Sammy together. He’s never had anyone to be really close to outside of me and Lil. When we moved to LA, I was the only person he could be himself around. You have no idea how happy I am to see him with family and friends who love him and accept him.” 

Ben wiped at his eyes, sniffling a little. “I uh...I’m gonna go hug him now. Unless you need any help?”

“Nah, I’ve just gotta get this simmering and then it’ll be sitting for a while. Go ahead.” Jack gestured towards the living room, and Ben got off the counter and walked out to the living room, immediately crawling into Sammy’s lap. Sammy didn’t even question it, just wrapped his arms around Ben and held him close. Emily was on the other end of the couch, and she looked at Ben to make sure he was okay, then focused on the documentary she and Sammy were watching. 

“How are you feeling?” Sammy asked after a while, rubbing Ben’s arm. 

“It’s  _ your  _ birthday. You shouldn’t be worried about me,” Ben replied. “Besides, I’m fine now. It’s just that Jack and I were talking about stuff that made me want to hug you.”

“What kind of stuff?” Sammy rested his chin on Ben’s head, brow furrowed slightly. 

“Just about how much we love you, and how happy we are to see you happy.” Ben shrugged slightly. “Typical things that future brothers-in-law talk about.”

“You two are so sappy,” Sammy teased. “I’m glad you have each other to have those kinds of conversations with because I’m not good at them.”

“You and Lily can pretend to be all cold and unfeeling together, even though we both know you feel things just as deeply as we do.” Ben poked Sammy’s chest playfully. “And don’t think I didn’t notice that list you’ve got going at the station.”

“What list?” Sammy asked, then his eyes widened in realization. “That’s not...we’re not talking about that.”

“What’s this list?” Emily asked curiously. Ben grinned at her. 

“Sammy’s got a list of things from the last five years to introduce Jack to,” Ben told her. “It’s very sweet. However, I did notice you don’t have the X-Files reboot on there, which is a crime against humanity, so I added it for you.”

“Is that what you were doing when you went to the office the other day?” Sammy asked. “I thought you were in there longer than you needed to be.”

“After your reactions to my notebooks, I was just curious about the notebook that suddenly showed up on your desk.” Ben shrugged. “It was open to the list. It’s not like I went through it or anything.”

“It’s mainly present ideas for everyone so you only would have been hurting yourself if you had.” Sammy stroked Ben’s hair gently. 

“It’s adorable that you keep a notebook of present ideas,” Emily remarked, smiling. “You’re so sweet.”

“I just...you guys are always so good at buying presents. Even Betty always manages to get me the best presents. I just want my presents to you to be good too. And there’s so many people to buy for now. I don’t want to accidentally forget someone.” Sammy blushed, hiding his face in Ben’s hair. Ben squeezed Sammy tightly. 

“We love anything you buy us, Sammy,” he told him. “Oh, speaking of Mom, she wants to have the whole family over for our Hanukkah dinner this year. You and Jack and Emily and Lily. I think she’s thinking of inviting Troy too.”

“Oooh, that’ll be fun!” Emily exclaimed. “Hanukkah, Christmas, and New Year’s all in a row!”

“I’ll end up gaining fifteen pounds,” Sammy complained, though he was smiling. 

“You could use some meat on your bones, babe,” Jack remarked as he walked into the room. He leaned over the back of the couch so he could rest his head against Sammy’s, wrapping his arms around him and resting his hands over Sammy’s on Ben’s arm. Sammy leaned into the hold, smiling. 

“Is dinner ready?” he asked. 

“Yeah. Let’s eat, and then we can cuddle properly while we watch movies.” Jack kissed Sammy’s neck. They all headed into the kitchen to eat. 

After dinner, they returned to the couch and settled in for a movie. Jack setter against the arm of the couch, with Sammy leaning against his chest and Ben curled up against Sammy’s chest. Emily took the armchair, waving away Ben’s offer to sit with her. 

“It’s Sammy’s birthday, and birthdays mean Benny cuddles,” she told him, smiling. Ben smiled back at her and relaxed against Sammy while he scrolled through Netflix until he found Jurassic Park. Ben fell asleep before the t-Rex even escaped, but after the emotional rollercoaster he’d had throughout the day, no one was going to blame him. 

**Author's Note:**

> I always get the feeling that Sammy’s the kind of person who never tells anyone when his birthday is. I also always think Ben’s got a lot of insecurities he works really hard to hide.


End file.
